Who Trolled Amber? - Sweet Bobby - Episode 5: (In)justice

Episode Date: November 25, 2021

After the confession, Kirat goes to the police. But their reaction to her case isn’t what she’s expecting. Plus: Alexi tries a new approach with the catfisher...Listen to the full six-part series today. For the premium Tortoise listening experience, curated by our journalists, download the free Tortoise audio app. For early and ad-free access to all our investigative series and daily and weekly shows, subscribe to Tortoise+ on Apple Podcasts.If you’d like to further support slow journalism and help us build a different kind of newsroom, do consider donating to Tortoise at tortoisemedia.com/support-us. Your contributions allow us to investigate, campaign and explore, and to build a newsroom that is responsible and sustainable. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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Good luck. Alright. Alright. I'm going up to Simran's house now. I'm a couple of doors away. A few days after episode three of this podcast goes out, I drive to West London one Monday morning to try and talk to Simran in person.

OK, we're at the door. I'm going to ring the bell. By now, quite a few people have heard this show, and Simran's name, it's out in the public. And I'm thinking, maybe that changes her calculations. Maybe now Simran has more incentive to speak to me. But still, I recognise it's a long shot. So as a backup plan, I've written her a letter

explaining why I think it's important we hear from her. I think there's someone at the window. He's probably seen the microphone there. A man, who I think is Simran's dad, peers out from behind a curtain, but just as quickly disappears. And then I hear a female voice. Hello? Can I help? They have one of those video doorbells and the voice, it sounds familiar.

Yes, I'm sorry to disturb you. My name is Alexi Mostras from Tortoise Media and I wondered if I could speak to Simran Bogle. She's not here at the moment. She's not here? Do you know when she'll be back? No, unfortunately not. Okay, fantastic. Thank you very much. I'm going to drop off a letter if that's okay and it would be great if you could ask her to read it. OK. Thank you very much. I'm pretty sure that's Simran on the intercom, pretending not to be at home. I'm putting the letter in the letterbox.

I think that was Simran, you know. I think that was a really... Oh, hold on. I won't go throughran, you know. I think that was a really... Oh, hold on. Won't go through. There you go. Right, letter dropped off. OK, we have to go. Well, that's all we can do. As I walk away from the house, I feel deflated.

All I've heard from Simran so far is the short legal statement you've heard at the end of each episode. Not exactly insightful. And I have to face facts. My chances of speaking to her aren't looking good. I mean, she sounded quite calm speaking through the doorbell, so if it was Simran, she didn't seem particularly spooked or outraged that we'd come up to her door.

Cool as a cucumber. If my aim has shifted in these later episodes, away from just reporting this story to helping hold Simran accountable for what she did to Kirat, then I wasn't getting very far. But then again, I'm just a journalist. And I was thinking,

Simran confessed to the catfish more than three years ago. And back then, Kirat spoke to someone else, an authority far better placed than me to hold Simran to account. The police received evidence of Simran's deception in 2018. So I wanted to know, what have they done since? And what are they doing now to help bring Kirat some justice? to help bring Kirat some justice.

And it doesn't seem fair to me. Maybe speaking on a personal level rather than a legal level, what do you think? I think she's been let down enormously by the authorities and I think they should have rigorously scrutinised it and looked at whether there is an angle here to prosecute the case. I mean, it just doesn't seem fair that Kirat is left in this position of devastation, a whole world upside down, years of her life taken away from her, and meanwhile her perpetrator is able to continue living her life

and get on with it as normal. I'm Alexi Mostras, and from Tortoise Media, you're listening to Sweet Bobby. Episode 5, Injustice. When Kirat learnt that Simran had been Bobby all along, that she had been scammed by her cousin for so many years, tricked into an online relationship, well, she didn't hang about. Kirat went straight to the police station that evening, in London,

despite Simran's parents asking her not to go. And Kirat didn't just go to the police because she was angry and upset, although she was both of those things. She'd been told to go by a police officer. You see, the real Bobby, who, if you remember, lived in Brighton, had reported Simran to his local police station as soon as he found out that she was behind it all. But Brighton police, they'd told Bobby that since Simran lived in London, that's where the case needed to be filed. As far as Brighton was concerned, this wasn't a matter for them. And a Brighton police officer also told Kirat this. He phoned her just after he spoke to Bobby. And this police officer, he advised Kirat to go to her local police station immediately. Why?

Because he said a serious crime may have been committed, one that she needed to report as soon as possible. So when Kirat went to Hounslow police station that night, she thought it would be the first step towards holding Simran to account. Except it didn't work out like that. At all. We were in that sort of kind of a police cubicle thing and I was explaining. And I said I'd been asked by Brighton Police Station to come in, explained like an overview of what had happened

and he said you know I can't see that what crime has been committed against you you know you've just been duped kind of thing and I was like but this has happened X amount has happened I've been forced to do this I was being bullied I was being intimidated I was scared for myself I was being bullied, I was being intimidated, I was scared for myself, I was made to stop talking to people. You know, lots of things. I explained all of these things that it was just a case of, but the guys in Brighton have had their identity stolen. They need to report it in Brighton. So you were being told that the victims were in Brighton, the victims were the real Bobby? Yeah. the victims were in Brighton, the victims were the real Bobby.

Yeah. There are 43 police forces in England and Wales. In fact, each region of the country has its own independent force, and they're supposed to collaborate, but often this just doesn't happen. What's the phrase? Sometimes the left hand doesn't know what the right hand is doing? When Keerat went to her local police station that night,

on the evening of Simran's confession, I think that's what happened to her. Hounslow police told her, Bobby's the victim. He's the one whose identity has been stolen. Whereas Brighton police, they were saying, no, no, Simran is in London, so London is where the case should be looked at. It was a frustrating situation and it was only going to get worse. I was slowly beginning to realise how crazy and fantastic the story was so that people

just weren't getting it. What was for me so straightforward, because it happened to me, so that people just weren't getting it. What was for me so straightforward, because it happened to me, I know it happened, you were suddenly creeping in that people were going, this is really crazy, this is really stupid, this is really weird, this is, what, could this happen? It's, like, too fantastic.

And that their default position was not to engage with it. Yeah. After her first meeting, Keira went back to Hounslow Police Station a few days later. First thing that happened is I'd walked in and we'd had the officer behind the desk. I'd called my aunt into the cubicle. And he'd said, you know, is she the right frame of mind? Is she a bit doolally, basically?

The officer suggested that you might have mental health problems. Yeah, that I might not be right in the head. And I could hear him from where I was standing. How did that make you feel? I actually left the police station. I walked out of that police station waiting room and I had a panic attack. Keira persisted. That week, she found herself in and out of Hounslow. It was basically potluck whether she was listened to or not. But there was one officer, a female officer, who seemed

to get it. She was very, you know, she was really good. She was really empathetic. She listened. seemed to get it. She was very, you know, she was really good. She was really empathetic. She listened. This seemed like progress. The police seemed to say they'd investigate. But then things went quiet. And it was only in October 2018, almost five months after she'd first reported it, that Hounslow called Kirat in again to give a video interview. And let's just say, it doesn't go great. Kirat is interviewed for a few hours, but the police officer doing the interview,

they have no knowledge of the case. So Kirat has to start from the very beginning, explaining how Bobby first made contact all the way back in 2010. And that means she only gets about 20 minutes to go through the worst period, the three years between 2015 and 2018, when she was in a controlling relationship with Bobby. And when I heard that, I was thinking,

it took me about a week to get my head around Kirat's story, and that was with the benefit of legal documents. So 20 minutes or so that's barely scratching the surface. So you felt when you got back in that the almost the most important section of the story certainly from the police's perspective that was rushed? Absolutely and I said it at the end and I was like so what's going to happen next then and she said well we'll need to take your phone which had other evidence on it and she said we'll probably bring Simran in for questioning. After her October meeting with Hounslow police things seemed to stall and every time Kirat phoned up the station they'd fob her off. Maybe her story

was too difficult. Maybe there was just too much social media evidence. Police forces in Britain are notoriously bad at dealing with digital evidence, even though in this case, Kirat tried to make it easy for them. At this stage, a family member was helping Kirat to compile evidence. When we found specific evidence of certain things, that we just screenshot it, attach it in the title, put a date, put whatever, brief description, so everything was really easy for them. Oh, literally.

And even she was saying to me, you shouldn't be doing this, this should be them doing this. It's like you're on trial here. She kept saying, why does it feel like you're on trial? And how did you know at this point, and in fact in general, that the police hadn't called in Simran? We're kind of making a very educated assumption that she hasn't been questioned by the police,

but we don't know that for sure. Oh, no, I know the police haven't called her in. They've confirmed that they haven't, so... This period in 2018 feels like a low point for Kirat. She's doing everything she can to hold Simran to account, and yet her claims just weren't being taken seriously. And there was an added cruelty too. Around this time, Kirat hears on the grapevine

that Simran has got a big promotion at work. And it turns out that was true. I've seen the press release. Simran was made a vice president at a British bank. You'd know the name. And it was a pretty big deal. Plus, her Twitter feed, it shows that she's recently gone on holiday to a wellness retreat. Her posts, they mention yoga.

They have pictures of palm trees and sunsets. And at the same time as this was happening, Kirat was at home struggling with the police. She was having nightmares. She couldn't sleep. And worst of all, she started getting anonymous texts and phone calls from an unknown number. I've seen these messages. They are pretty sexually explicit, pretty nasty. And when Kirat phoned the number, she heard Indian music in the background. The same sort of music she heard in the background when she was speaking to Simran's characters. Was this Simran? We've got no way of knowing for sure, but it made Kirat feel like this whole trauma was far from over.

I'd come to that realisation that everywhere I turned, doors were shutting, and as I worked through the reasoning why it all ended up with Simran, why was it difficult for me to get a job right now? Because of this, because of that, because of whatever, because of what Simran did. Why am I to get a job right now? Because of this, because of that, because of whatever, because of what Simran did. Why am I not in a relationship right now? Is it going to be easy for me to be in one? All comes back to Simran.

You know, am I ever going to be a mum? Maybe, maybe not. Why? You know, I can't say all, because you never know what's written in your future. But that probability is reduced and the reason why, the high percentage of it, is Simran. At this point, I started thinking maybe one of the obstacles Kirat was bumping up against was the word catfishing itself. After all, to many people it sounds like an online joke.

Maybe someone pretending to be someone else on Tinder to get a date. More embarrassing than genuinely harmful. And perhaps this is what the police were thinking. That Kirat was the victim of a prank that got out of hand. Serious, yes, but not a police matter. And if this was the police's view, it wouldn't actually be that unreasonable, because catfishing itself is not a criminal offence in Britain. It seems extraordinary to me, but you can deceive someone online for years without any criminal consequences. So however frustrated Kirat was getting with the police, maybe, legally speaking, they had a point.

This case, oh my God, where to start? What the hell has been going on? Is this really true? Charlotte Proudman is a barrister. She specialises in gender-based violence and coercive control. I'm going to have to have my notes up for this, and normally I don't have my notes up when I do interviews, but this one is just so extraordinary and there's so much going on.

Yeah, there is so much going on. I just couldn't believe that someone could do what Simran did and get away with it. So I asked Charlotte, did Simran do anything, in her opinion, to Keira, which crossed the line into criminality? And it just makes me think maybe, you know, maybe there is a criminal case here.

Yeah, yeah, I think that there is. I think looking at this, hearing the evidence that's available to support it, it does fit within the legislation and within the guidance on coercive and controlling behaviour. So certainly there seems to be a public interest in prosecuting this because this type of behaviour should never be tolerated. And there seems to be evidence available to support a prosecution. What Charlotte was telling me was that Hounslow Police actually had ample grounds to investigate Simran Bogle. Not for catfishing, perhaps, but for another criminal offence

altogether. Coercive and controlling behaviour has been illegal in England and Wales since 2015. And what Charlotte was telling me was that Simran may not have behaved illegally by pretending to be Bobby, but she may have crossed a line when she used Bobby to control Kirat to the extent that she did. In my view, it fits squarely within the current legislation. Forcing her to quit her job, to quit her friends, to stay at home waiting for Bobby's call. Deactivating Facebook to prove she's not flirting with other people. He's prone to mood swings, blames her for this.

She turns down a promotion because of the stress of dealing with Bobby. The fact that she had to be signed off with stress. Losing weight. Charlotte told me that coercive control might not be the only law that Simran breached. She may have broken laws preventing harassment, sexual offences, and something called the Malicious Communications Act. And the police response to all this, given all those potential breaches? Was it justified in all the circumstances?

According to Charlotte, that's a big fat no. Yeah, I think it was quite interesting to see that the police had asked her whether she, or in fact not even asked her but asked an aunt, whether she was suffering from psychiatric or mental health conditions. That was their response so again victim blaming suggesting that she's somehow complicit in this deception and web of lies because she's mentally ill rather than recognizing that actually this could potentially happen to anybody and i think the police either finding it too difficult to get involved with, or thinking that it's a family incident, it's a family affair,

or as it's referred to, it's just a domestic, no crime committed here. It's something that I see quite a lot on police records. What do you think should have happened? I think that they should have carefully looked at whether the offence of coercive and controlling behaviour was made out. I mean, we've been through the different limbs of coercive and controlling behaviour was made out. I mean, we've been through the different limbs of coercive and controlling behaviour, and I think arguably it is made out on the evidence that's available, and I question whether the police actually looked at all of that evidence,

and I question what evidence that they received from Simran. in the wrong way. Feeling distracted? You're not alone. Whether renting, considering buying a home, or renewing a mortgage, many Canadians are finding it hard to focus with housing costs on their minds. For free tools and resources to help you manage your home finances and clear your head, visit Canada.ca slash It Pays to Know. A message from the Government of Canada. ACAST powers the world's best podcasts. Here's a show that we recommend. Hi, I'm Una Chaplin, and I'm the host of a new podcast called Hollywood Exiles. It tells the story of how my grandfather, Charlie Chaplin, and many others were caught up in a campaign to root out communism in Hollywood.

It's a story of glamour and scandal and political intrigue and a battle for the soul of the nation. Hollywood Exiles from CBC Podcasts and the BBC World Service. Find it wherever you get your podcasts. Acast helps creators launch, grow, and monetize their podcasts everywhere. Acast.com. Hey, Amrit. How are you doing? Good morning. Nice to see you.

Likewise. How are you? Good. You look tired, like me. Yeah, well, it's been a busy week. In October 2018, Kirat didn't have access to Charlotte like I did. In fact, months after she reported Simran to the police, it looked like she was running out of options.

Despite handing the police evidence that Simran had coercively controlled Kirat through Bobby, the investigation was going nowhere. And then came a chance meeting with a guy called Amrit Mann. So welcome to my humble abode. The Punjab. Coffin garden. All rows lead to the Punjab. Come on in.

Imagine if a fairy godmother owned an Indian restaurant and you'd come quite close to Amrit. This is where the story all started for me. This was where I first met you and I first met Kirat. He's the fourth generation owner of the Punjab, an institution of a restaurant in the middle of Covent Garden in central London. And he's the type of person, when you meet him once, you don't forget. Always smiling, always wearing a suit. We've been here since the early 1950s.

The walls of the restaurant are lined with pictures of celebrities who have eaten his food. This gentleman over here is a Shahid, a freedom fighter. He was a very close friend to my great-grandfather, the founder of the Punjab. The place is like a character itself, and everyone in this story has been here at one time or another. The Punjab is where I first met Kirat, and our initial conversation was fuelled by king prawn booners and chicken madras. You have some drive.

You've got some good food to keep us all going. And it was also where Kirat first met Amrit in autumn of 2018, around five months after Simran's confession. And she didn't know then that he would help revitalise her case. I've come here to hear how that happened. and we're sitting in a private room upstairs, a place Amrit calls his war room. There's a dumb waiter that runs directly up from the restaurant below, and you'll hear it clunk when it arrives. Well, should we just start with the start, basically,

which is, how did you first meet Kirat? Yeah, it was 3rd of October 2018. She walked in, she had a meeting with me because I had signed up to this crazy television advertising for an international channel. Kirat had turned up to sort out the terms of a business contract. She was working for a Punjabi TV channel and they were planning to showcase Amrit's restaurant.

But I picked something up and I don't know what it was. I remember and I was intrigued. Shakespeare always says that the eyes are a window to the soul. And I picked something up and I looked and I looked at her eyes. I knew something was not right. And I knew she was suffering in silence. Despite not mentioning her case, Amrit felt that there was something not quite right. Towards the end of the meeting, she mentioned, she dropped this nugget, this golden nugget, that she had a legal case.

I'm talking to the police. It's not going anywhere. Amrit thought he could help, because he isn't just the owner of the Punjab. She had no clue that in my spare time, I am a pro bono solicitor, and I work with victims of crime. A few weeks later, Ankurat was back in the restaurant. And this time, she revealed a little bit more about what happened. And it was all about listening. It took me up to about three months for the pain to drop,

to understand fully the magnitude of the whole Bobby, the fake Bobby stuff. But from day one, from that second meeting in person, I believed her. Did she give you the witness statement at this point, around this point, that she had prepared? No. That came later, didn't it?

That came later. So this was just, you didn't even have a written document to rely on? No, it was just my mind, my fragile mind. Even with Amrit's legal background, it took him a long time to appreciate the full extent of what had happened. But as soon as he did, he became Kirat's supporter. Finally, someone she could rely on to fight her corner. I never get emotionally connected to my clients.

But this one, I don't know, my blood boiled. And I put it down to my mum's linkage, my mum's blood. We get quite emotional. And I felt angry. I felt, this is not right. This is appalling. So with that, Kirat had the first member of what would later become a team around her.

And Team Kirat wasn't going to settle for the police doing nothing. I said, let's go. Let's go to the police station. Let's go and find out what the state is. So turn up, suits and booted, with Kirat. And suddenly no one wants to come down. No one wants to see us. They took offence. Why was there a lawyer there?

And the investigating officer was doing her job. We just wanted to ask her, where are we? How can we assist? How can we support? How can we, you know, help with the investigation? But it just was clear they wanted us to go away. While Amrit was putting pressure on the police to give Kirat an update, they also decided to go down another route. If Simran dodged criminal liability,

they thought maybe she could be held accountable in the civil courts. Although Amrit was a solicitor, he acted more as an informal advisor to Kirat. So Kirat looked for another lawyer, a specialist. And she found him just by googling something like catfishing lawyer and seeing what turned up. And the lawyer she found, a guy called Yeir Cohen, is actually someone I know from way back. He is a specialist in online harms and internet stalking. And together, Amrit, Yaya and Kirat, they drafted something to Simran called a letter before action,

which is basically a letter telling someone that you're thinking of taking legal action against them. Eventually got to a point where we were ready, ready to serve. Kirat's letter accused Simran of misusing her private information, harassment and breach of data protection laws. So when you were going for the civil case, what were your kind of objectives? What did you want to get out of it?

Reputation. That's it. And that involved what you hoped would be a public apology? Yes. I thought it would happen really quickly. I thought she'd be just scared by the legal letter and do what she needed to do. But it wasn't the case. When she got the letter before action, Simran didn't buckle. In fact, she did the opposite.

She doubled down. She was going to fight. And this is very interesting in terms of Simran's psychology. Something that feels like a puzzle that we're constantly trying to put together. Because I would have thought the same as Kirat. Here's someone who has already confessed, who had a good job, who wants to get on with their life. Wouldn't someone in that position cave to a legal threat? Wouldn't they just want it all to go away? But once again, Simran defied expectations. Simran's lawyers, they came back with this kind of allegation that Simran was young and Harker was an adult, Simran was a child, and Kira went ballistic. I was just on the phone.

To be accused of that was awful. And again, I think... I think the lawyers even used the word grooming. Yeah. Yeah. Simran called in her lawyers and they argued something pretty extraordinary. Despite her double confession, once to Bobby and then to Kirat, the lawyers argued that Simran was the real victim. They accused Kirat as an adult of grooming her younger cousin while she was still at school. In fact, I know exactly what they said

because I've seen the letter. It is our case that your client groomed our client to play her part in this elaborate but ludicrous interaction. We would agree that there has been extensive manipulation, but it is the defendant's case that this has been carried out by your adult client. Now, I should say, I've seen cases where lawyers go off on one, acting aggressively to try and make the claimant back down. But ultimately, a legal response reflects the position of the client. So when I quote from these legal letters, I have to presume that they broadly represent Simran's own view.

And Simran's lawyers also claimed that Kirat had always known that Simran was Bobby. And why should Kirat have allowed that situation to continue? Well, Simran's lawyers said, and again I'm quoting, because Kirat received attention and excitement in what otherwise may have been a life absent these ingredients. And there's more. They threatened to go public with their allegation if Kirat pursued the case further. I mean, that's seriously harsh. To me, the letters are very clearly victim-blaming.

Basically, a loyally way of saying, you asked for it. You knew what was happening all the time. saying, you asked for it. You knew what was happening all the time. When Kirat received these letters last year, it was a massive blow. And if I was her, honestly, I think I'd be pretty close to giving up. Because, despite Amrit and Yair's help, Kirat seemed no closer to holding Simran to account. Almost two years after the confession, the police investigation was going nowhere and Simran had come out all guns blazing.

Yeah, so it's outrageous. So I just thought that's so low and so disgusting of you. You've already confessed. So the tactics reinforced your determination? It just told me how low she was as a person, how low she was willing to go to scare me and intimidate me into silence. So I just stuck to my guns. It was terrifying, but I'm just, you know, something, the final episode.

Kirat makes a breakthrough in her case, but Simran has one more card to play. While making the series, Simran's lawyers gave us this statement on her behalf. This matter concerns a family dispute over events that began over a decade ago, when I was a schoolgirl. As far as I'm concerned, this is a private family matter that has been resolved, and I strongly object to the numerous unfounded and seriously defamatory accusations that have been made about me, as well as details of private matters that have been shared with the media. An investigation by the Metropolitan Police into Kiratasi's case

found that their officers made significant efforts to understand her account, but they concluded that no existing laws were broken. Thanks for listening to this episode. Sweet Bobby was written and reported by me, Alexi Mostras, produced by Gary Marshall, with additional reporting and production by Claudia Williams. Sound design is by Carla Patella. The executive producer is Basha Cummings. If you can't wait until next week for episode 6, you can listen on Monday on the Tortoise website. Members get early ad-free access to every episode.

You can download the app and take out a 30-day free trial. We're going to be recording a question and answer session with Kira for an exclusive bonus episode, which will be available for Tortoise members. If you'd like to submit your question for Kira to answer, please email us on sweetbobby at tortoismedia.com.